Best Downloadable Games: Puzzle - Platformer edition

26/05/2011

My favourite thing about the Xbox Live Arcade is that it rescued from near annihilation the genre that made my childhood, that of the 2-D puzzle-platform. The Live arcade gave a platform for near the extinct, but much loved genre to thrive, and, did it ever thrive! The Live arcade is now home to puzzle-platforms that not only win awards and acclaim like nobodies business, but also have gone on to seriously compete for (and in some case win) the coveted "game of the year" award from many respected games outlets, in some cases beating off competition from full 3D games with multi-million dollar budgets from developers with impressive pedigrees. These are the best downloadable games that can be delivered fresh from the internet to your console for under £10. If you only had £20 and asked me which two of the arcades puzzle-platforms were the best downloadable games and where could you get your hands on them, I'd answer the latter with marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/Games/XboxArcadeGames and the former with:

1)Limbo. A boy wakes up in a darkened forest, where he quickly becomes aware that danger lurks in all quarters. Between the amazing art style (nearly everything in the entire game looks like a living silhouette), the subtly terrifying atmosphere story or the real sense of vulnerability that the protagonist exudes, Limbo blew the critics away, winning a BAFTA for best game as well as giant heap of other industry awards.

2)Shadow Complex. Imagine this: You're out spelunking in a cave with your girlfriend, when suddenly you get separated from her. Exploring on a bit further, you see her get capture by some goons wearing futuristic armour and pulled into a large underground base complex. What do you do? Call the police? The Army? Not if you're Jason Flemming, the hero of shadow complex. He storms the underground base, killing the hundreds of goons in it room by room, in delightful mix of exploration, shooting, item collection, puzzles, top-notch graphics and a silly story that involves super-suits, spaceships and the death of a vice-president. When it was released in late 2009, Shadow Complex smashed all sales records for Xbox Live arcade, and a year later IGN named it as the top Xbox Live Arcade game of all time, a accolade I heartily agree with!